Georgia sits at the northern edge of this rodent’s entire range, which reaches only Florida and the southeastern corner of Georgia, and its records here cluster in and around the Okefenokee Swamp. That makes the Okefenokee’s freshwater marsh essentially the species’ toehold in the state, a Coastal Plain wetland with the dense sedge and maidencane growth this muskrat depends on.
Unlike the widespread common muskrat found across most of North America, this species builds distinctive dome-shaped lodges out of marsh vegetation rather than burrowing into a bank, and it feeds almost entirely on the aquatic plants growing right around its lodge. That specialization ties it to permanent, shallow marsh rather than the rivers and lake edges other Georgia rodents use.
Records run through the year with bumps in winter and spring, though with counts this low that pattern is tentative rather than a firm seasonal signal.
Full species profile
